Ralph Cipriano did a marvelous job covering the sickening sex abuse and cover-up trial in Philadelphia. Up today is a post with some commentary from one of the jurors. She also participates in the thread that follows. This comment about why Msgr wasn’t convicted of conspiracy:

I specifically requested that the foreman send out a question (which he did) asking if the result of a conspiracy was that a child was endangered, did the endangerment also have to be the intent. Judge Sarmina told us that it did, which made it nearly impossible to convict, with the elements that we were given of conspiracy.

Once the trial was over, I asked one of the D.A.’s why the Conspiracy was to EWOC (endangering the welfare of children). He stated that every conspiracy has to have a goal. Well why on
earth didn’t they charge him with Conspiracy to commit fraud, or something like that?

Good question. I don’t think any bishop or bureaucrat conspired to harm children. They conspired with one another to keep quiet, cross their fingers, and hope the moral formation of seminary would finally take. That children were harmed by the repeated shuttling of predators and the cover-up of their crimes was a tragic “accident” of the system. Unless, of course, there’s a bishop out there who wants to dispute that.

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Todd lives in the Pacific Northwest, serving a Catholic parish as a lay minister.